Review: Who Wants To Be A Millionaire: Special Editions

Who Wants To Be A Millionaire is about as basic as quiz shows get. 15 questions, 3 lifelines, and a big cash prize. The only obstacle is how much general knowledge you have rocking around in your head, and how intelligent your chosen friend to phone is when you get stuck. DoubleSix has done a fine job translating the show onto PSN, although it is an admittedly light package when it comes to features.

The first thing you notice when you start a game is how well put together everything is. The set seems to be faithful to the show, the host looks presentable enough, and the atmosphere of the show has certainly been laid on thick. Every question starts with the traditional camera pan and that signature jingle, giving me the feeling that DoubleSix was given pretty much full access to the show’s sound library. It certainly feels authentic, even if the host is some sort of generic approximation of Chris Tarrant, the host over here in the UK. The questions are good, and the difficulty certainly ramps up alongside the questions in much the same way as it does in the show itself.

Of course, once you’ve played one round of the show, you’ve pretty much played everything there is in the base game. You can play it with some friends, and that’s fun enough if you have people around to play with. The game’s only online option is to buy DLC question packs, which at the moment range from Movie trivia to South Park questions, which also have the effect of changing all the characters except the host into characters from the show. Playing quiz games with friends is often hilarious, so the lack of any online options whatsoever is rather disappointing. Although, judging by how Europe centric the questions are, I’m not sure the other guys on the site would have much of a fun time answering them. Nevertheless, the lack of an online option is disappointing.

Who Wants To Be A Millionaire is a relatively bare bones package unless you choose to shell out for the DLC. It’s faithful to the show, but that isn’t necessarily enough variety to make you want to play more than one round in a session. If you like the show, you’ll like the game based on it. It’s as simple as that really.

A copy of this game was provided by the publisher for review purposes. For more info on our review policy click here. This review is for the PlayStation 3 version of the game.